After I realize that Tina isn’t actually coming back, I decide that a bath will be the best way to soothe my nerves, to calm myself, and the best part: The bathroom door has a lock.

I turn both faucets and the water rushes into the tub, the sound loud in the small space. I pull off my clothes, humming a few bars of the Moonlight Sonata under my breath. The steam from the water fills the room, fogging the mirrors.

I sit on the toilet lid, looking forward to the hot water relaxing the tightness of my muscles. I stretch my neck to one side, then to the other. All the stress that I’m holding in my neck releasing with each crack and pop.

The water fills up to two-thirds of the way, just how I like it. I turn off the knobs and the pipes shut off with a clank. I ease my body into the tub slowly, the hot water stinging at first, but I feel myself relaxing. I lie back with a sigh. I think about the Moonlight Sonata again, allowing my arms to float, weightless in the water. My fingers move to the ghostly echoes of the notes in my head, darkly soothing. In Music History, we learned about how the Moonlight Sonata got its name, because a critic thought the piece sounded like a boat adrift in the moonlight. But I always thought it sounded more like a current, like the swift course of a mountain stream. Cold and tranquil, and then the countermelody is a slippery shape in the water, something wild and untamed slithering under the surface.

There’s a sound above me that disrupts my concentration. A scratching, like nails being dragged across the wood. But not in the same room as me. It’s coming from somewhere outside. Scratch scratch, tap. Scratch scratch, tap. I try to ignore it, but it continues, growing louder. I open my eyes and look up at the small window above my head. It’s right at eye level if you stand up in the tub. Not low enough for any neighbors to see through, only to let a little light in during the day.

The sound doesn’t stop, and now I’m worried. It could just be a branch that’s tapping against the window, or it could be an animal trapped up there. Like the one time we found a raccoon in our attic.

It’s probably nothing, but I have to check. I stand up, the water pouring off me, and I pull at the lever that opens the blinds. It’s only a branch. The blinds lift, I squint because I don’t have my glasses on, and then I see eyes staring back at me.

A face with a gray pallor. Eyes filled with darkness, only red pinpricks in the center. A mouth that seems to stretch wider and wider before my eyes, open in a cavernous scream.

I stumble back and slip, bash my elbow on the soap dish and land half sprawled in the tub, water sloshing out from the side.

There can’t be anything there, I tell myself. We’re two stories up. There’s nothing there. But I’m not standing up to find out. My hand fumbles for the towel on the rack, then I look down to realize the water has turned black underneath me. Murky, tinged with green, thick with slime. Before I can comprehend it, a hand shoots out of the water and grabs the top of my head, pulls me face-first into the tub.

The water fills my nose and rushes into my mouth as I gasp for breath. I’m suspended in darkness, face down and thrashing. I can’t touch the sides of the tub, which makes no sense. There should be lights overhead, and yet I can see nothing. The panic fills me quickly as I choke on the water, flailing in the dark. But a warmth grips my wrist, and a green light floods my vision. I’m pulled upward, and then flung out with force.

I land with a hard thud on the floor. The wood floor is cool against my face. Parts of my body ache from where they struck it. I roll onto my side, coughing, spewing up water. The only light in here is from outside, peeking through the shutters. Everything looks fuzzy, but there’s the looming shadow of my bed, vague shape of my posters on the wall. I’m in my bedroom. Not the bathroom.

If I simply rolled out of bed, then why is everything wet? I push myself up on one wrist, wincing. It hurts. Everything hurts. My other hand lands in a puddle of water. Water drips from my hair, pooling beneath me. My clothes are soaked too.

I lift my arm, and my bracelet glows faintly green, illuminating the dark. Just like the light that shone beneath the water. I crawl over to my desk and fumble for my glasses, reach for my phone. With my phone in hand, I unlock the screen just as I hear skittering overhead. Like tiny claws running over wood. I catch movement in the corner of my eye, my curtain fluttering along the windowsill. A glimpse of a shadow behind the sheer curtain. I crouch down then, panting, afraid.

I press the flashlight button and point the beam toward the window. The light floods the room, illuminating the tiny forms. Shriveled bodies hang off my curtains, chittering as they try to avoid the light. One of them jumps down on my headboard while the other lands on top of my desk, scattering papers and pens to the floor. They look like…monkeys. Short black fur and red eyes, faces pink and wizened. They raise their spindly arms to cover their faces as the light hits them, screeching.

I scramble back, almost slipping again on the water on the floor. They jump up and down, flashing fangs, their shrieking reaching a feverish pitch, drilling into my ears. I count five in all. One of them picks up my pen and brandishes it like a knife, advancing toward me. While another jumps onto my bed, and another lands with a thud on the floor. They chatter at each other, beady eyes focused on me as they draw closer. I keep moving backward until my outstretched fingers brush against my door. My hand inches for the doorknob, ready to fling myself into the hallway.

But before I can escape, they scream. They launch themselves at me, like tiny torpedoes. One lands on my head and dangles off my hair while the second digs tiny claws into my shoulder. I rip the shoulder one off, throwing it against the wall. The one above me chitters, furious, and the rest begin to climb my legs. My scalp burns from the weight of the monkey pulling at my hair, and I yank it off me, throwing it to the floor. But then I scream when one of them sinks its fangs into my wrist. I drop my phone, batting at any one of them that I can reach.

There’s a clatter as beads fall to the floor, bouncing everywhere. The cries of the monkeys reach a feverish pitch of excitement, somewhere beyond the beam of the phone flashlight. I jump to my feet and grab a clipboard from the wall with one hand to use as a weapon, slamming my other palm on the switch to turn on the overhead light. I stand there, trembling, ready to hit the next monkey that attacks me again.

But there’s nothing.

Just smears of water on the floor. Beads scattered everywhere. I look under the bed, throw off the sheets and the pillows. Check my bookshelf, under the desk, open the doors to my closet. I pull out all the drawers of my desk, my dresser. Still nothing.

I get on my hands and knees and pick up each of the beads, putting them into an empty jar. I hold one, then another up to the light and notice that they have gone dark, murky. Some of them have streaks of black upon the surface, as if they were held up to a flame. Charred.

Delia and Shen told me I could contact them if anything were to happen. I think this qualifies as something fucking finally happening. It’s time to send Shen a message. It takes me a few tries to even unlock my phone, my hands are shaking so bad. I take a photo of the beads and send it, along with one word:

Help.